Time-traveling teen scientist novel sparks bidding war

According to The Hollywood Reporter, a Young Adult novel about a physics prodigy and heartbroken girl named Gottie Oppenheimer just got snapped up by MacMillan Children’s Books. Seven other publishers were in the bidding for author Harriet Reuter Hapgood’s upcoming novel The Square Root of Summer, but MacMillan won out with a six-figure, two book deal.

I’m so excited about this protagonist based on The Bookseller’s description of the novel:

The Square Root of Summer is described as a YA contemporary with a twist, in which seventeen-year-old physics prodigy Gottie Oppenheimer navigates a summer of grief, trying to reconcile her first heartbreak with her last.

I’m getting Doctor Who meets Frankie Landau-Banks vibes and I like it.

Hapgood published the e-novella Last Christmas in 2013, but this will be her first novel to land with a major publisher.

I’m burnt out on YA books about vampires, werewolves, and dystopian futures, so I welcome this novel about a heartbroken, time traveling scientist with open arms. The Square Root of Summer will hit bookshelves in 2016. A film adaptation is probably not far behind.

Danielle Henderson is a lapsed academic, heavy metal karaoke machine, and culture editor at Fusion. She enjoys thinking about how race, gender, and sexuality shape our cultural narratives, but not in a boring way.